Oscar Wilde : A Certain Genius

After William Shakespeare, Oscar Wilde (1854-1900) is the most quoted of writers. His epigrams turned conventions upside down and are part of our cultural inheritance. His personality defined an era. His popularity as a wit, a dramatist and an icon continues to grow. One hundred years after Wilde’s death, he remains entertaining and outlandish, talking about everything and nothing. Wilde’s rise to prominence as an unparalleled playwright of high comedy, and his ego-driven fall from grace continue to fascinate. His life, famous trial and his death were played out in the full glare of the public’s gaze. Barbara Belford’s Wilde is for a new generation of readers: not the tragic figure, the martyr, the self-destructive fop. Instead Belford explores his sexuality in a more relaxed manner than previous biographers, she opens up the gaps between the facts to portray Oscar Wilde in all his complexity, genius and humanity.